Allen Iverson

Great win yesterday by the Sixers. Just an absolute trouncing of the LeBron led Los Angeles Lakers, showcasing a new and improved roster that has yet to gel but it still throttling less talented teams with more scoring options than this franchise has ever seen.

And yet, all I want to talk about this morning is Allen Iverson wearing the EXACT REPLICA of David Puddy’s 8-ball jacket from Seinfeld.

It’s not even a matter of it looking “similar” … it is the exact same jacket David Puddy wore during the end credits of the Season 9, episode 12 classic “The Reverse Peephole” in the television series Seinfeld.

Back in 1999 I saw Matt Geiger viciously elbow Keith Van Horn in the face at the behest of a pair of drunkards at the First Union Center.

Let me back up. The year was 1999. I was 17 and the weight of the world had yet to completely crush my spirit. The 76ers were a few years away from being relevant, but they were entertaining and the seeds had been planted for greatness. Allen Iverson was crossing up Jordan, the country was prosperous and led by an adulterer instead of a dunce, and my buddy’s dad had bought lower level season tickets for 1998-1999 for no reason whatsoever.

Seriously, I think he went to like, maybe 4 games that entire season. So who took up the slack? Yours truly. What a time to be alive.

A lone figure stands, weeping, on the edge of the Ben Franklin Bridge on a dark and cold December night in Philadelphia. He looks down into the dark abyss as the wind and snow whips his Gucci suit around his pasty body. Wiping away tears, Sam Hinkie, GM of the Philadelphia 76ers, loosened his grip on the bridge cables, ready to make one last final plunge into the Delaware River.

“What are you doing there friend?” A voice says from the sidewalk. Hinkie looks down and sees a kindly old man wearing a cotton winter coat and fedora, looking up at him with a strange smile on his face.

“I’m….not that it’s any of your business, but I’m going to end it all. This world doesn’t need me, this city doesn’t need me. The fans hate me, the NBA made the organization hire someone that is going to take away all my power, my process isn’t going to last…everyone….everyone would be better off if I wasn’t here! If I had never been in any of their lives,” Hinkie said, crying again.

(For best effect, please listen to the song at the end of the article.)

Philadelphia, PA – 76ers GM Sam Hinkie, along with 10 other Philadelphia basketball legends, left for Brooklyn this morning in five non-descript black SUVs, having spent the past several weeks concocting a plan to assure the 76ers win the NBA draft lottery this evening.

Corie Blount! Philadelphia 76ers power forward from 2001-2002. Larry Brown knew he needed one more cog to push the 76ers over the hump after bowing out in the 2001 championship round against the Lakers, but my-oh-my Corie Blount was not that cog. The 33-year-old waste of space had one and only move whenever his stone hands actually caught a pass, a blind, horrible turnaround jump shot that usually found itself bouncing off the skull of a fan in the fifth row of the First Union Center.

Blount appeared in 72 for the Sixers (somehow starting 21 of them) for the defending Eastern conference champions and did not dazzle. He averaged 6.5 points a game and less than a block a game, but to his credit he did average about 9 rebounds a game, most of them quickly followed up by a turnaround jump shot off the top of the backboard or an errant pass clanging off the scoreboard of the First Union Center.

Blount did lead the team in one key category….most times being called a “Waste of space hack” by Allen Iverson, averaging about 6.3 times per game.

Corie Blount Fun Facts:

– Blount was sentenced to one year in an Ohio prison in 2009 for marijuana possession. He did not see the irony in his arrest which cost him serious votes in the “High Times” Man of the Year award.

– Shoved into a locker by Dikembe Mutombo after every single home game.

– Unsuccessfully tried to get his teammates to call him and Iverson by the dual nickname, “The Answer and the Question.” Was shot down by Aaron McKie after he reportedly said, “The only question I can think of is why you’re still on this team.”

– Lost to a 14-year-old fan in a halftime “Layup, free throw, three point shot” contest. Was stuck on the free throw portion for 25 shots.

– Attended one of Pat Croce’s pirate ship dive excursions during the all-star break. Was left in the middle of the Pacific Ocean after Croce “forgot” he was still underwater. Made it back to the team for the start of the second half of the season, to the disappointment of everyone.